Nope, Not A Fluke

[filkertom]

Remember Paul Potts, that cell phone salesman who wants to be an opera singer? Semi-final performance on Britain's Got Talent. Won that one, too. The live final is tonight.

Thanks to trdsf for the heads-up...

ETA: ... and for links to Paul's performance in the finale and the announcement of the winner (hint: it wasn't the ventriloquist act).

Comments

[wyattkelly.livejournal.com]

HOly freakin' cow. My folks mentioned him today while I was muscling a 75 pound mattress up a flight of stairs, and then you noted him. He is is absolutely amazing. Even my roommate was speechless. He looks like 40 miles of bad road, but he's got the voice of Gabriel.

[filkertom.livejournal.com]

And, apparently, in something like a week and a half he's become the top-rated act on YouTube. The first video, linked above, is over 2-1/2 million views.

[tropism.livejournal.com]

The thing that really bugs me abut his looks is that it looked like he's about to break out in tears, even when he's in the middle of a song. argh.

Fucking marvelous voice, though.

[maiac.livejournal.com]

Thanks for the link, Tom! I've been wondering about the next round.

[maiac.livejournal.com]

And what does it say about our respective societies that Britain has Paul Potts and we have Sanjaya?

[redaxe.livejournal.com]

What does it say about the world when the first time I heard about Mr. Potts (in a story on the radio, which included a clip of his voice), I had just been listening to Harry Chapin and had had to stop because I couldn't deal with "Mr. Tanner"?

I hope this guy wins and gets the career he clearly deserves.

[lizreay.livejournal.com]

Love your icon! :)

[starcat-jewel.livejournal.com]

Wow. I don't even like opera, but I can sure tell quality when I hear it. If this guy doesn't get an offer from some reasonably-well-known opera company, it'll be a miscarriage of justice.

[wildcard9.livejournal.com]

Paul Potts is most assurably the real deal. He looks too nervous up on stage so I hope he at least gets a recording contract. Then again, we have not seen him in an actual opera, just performing two arias while standing before huge audiences, so I don't blame him for being nervous and just concentrating on not making a mistake during the song.

[r-caton.livejournal.com]

One of the judges reckoned he'd be doing his debut album next week...
good voice but could do with some training if you ask me. Must have been hellish nervous though. I was wondering whether either of the moppets they had there would trump him with the TV audience vote... one who was oozing stage school and another who had the "right" teeth missing in the centre of her upper set and had a very very slight lithp who sang "over the Rainbow" OMG cuteness overload!!!
But Potts won even over the ickle girlies dangled in front of the voting public, not known for ignoring the "Awwww BLESS" factor.
So he must be good, I reckon.

[filkertom.livejournal.com]

Actually, Simon specifically said he would be. Remember that Simon made his name and his money as a record label owner. I bet Paul will indeed be in a studio... Simon's.

[r-caton.livejournal.com]

Ahhhh
So a profitable outcome for all concerned.....

[acelightning.livejournal.com]

[lizreay.livejournal.com]

Y'know, I really hate having my husband walk in on me crying... dammit!!! :) That guy is amazing. I'm really hoping some opera company somewhere scoops him up.

[louisadkins.livejournal.com]

He won! (http://talent.itv.com/page.asp?partid=354)

[trdsf.livejournal.com]

He did Nessun Dorma again for the final tonight... and blew his own previous performance out of the water. The waterworks started as soon as he started singing.

The announcement of the winner is here.

One of the comments I saw appended to one of the videos says that the reason some opera purists are being snotty about Mr. Potts is because in one week, he's brought more people to an appreciation of opera than all the purists taken together have in their entire lives.

[filkertom.livejournal.com]

Oy.

Thanks for the links, Rev. YEAH!

[trdsf.livejournal.com]

Let's put it this way -- I'm as obsessed a golf fan as you would want to meet, and I still haven't looked to see who won the US Open today because I wanted more to find the video of Potts' inevitable triumph. :)

FYI, a the lyrics, a translation, and a brief discussion of the Nessun Dorma aria are here